Teotihuacan Treasures Visit Paris, France

The most innovative and vast exhibition mounted about Teotihuacan Culture, composed by more than 450 archaeological pieces that leave Mexico for the first time, was inaugurated in the Quai Branly Museum, in Paris, France.

The exhibit “Teotihuacan, City of Gods” gives account of 8 centuries of power of the city that was the 8th largest of the world in its time (150 BC-650AD), reaching a 20 square kilometers area, where nearly 100,000 persons dwelled.

The official inauguration of the exhibition, open from October 6th 2009, was in charge of Frederic Miterrand, French Minister of Culture, Carlos Icaza, Mexican Ambassador in France, and Alfonso de Maria y Campos, general director of the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH), institution in charge of the organization of the show.

“This is a vast exhibition of Teotihuacan Culture, which, unlike Maya or Aztec civilizations, was never mounted before”, declared De Maria during the inaugural visit, where he remarked that among most outstanding pieces are the ones found during the last archaeological explorations.

The Great Xalla Jaguar, sculptural façade that conserves rests of its polychromy, is one of the jewels of the show, declared the INAH director, after mentioning there are new excavations taking place at Teotihuacan, where tunnels and offering deposits have been discovered.

“Teotihuacan, City of Gods” is product of a hundred years of exploration at the emblematic archaeological zone declared World Cultural heritage in 1987 by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). French public have the opportunity to know at the adapted area of the Quai Branly Museum, urbanism and architecture that characterized the ancient metropolis.

Conceived from the curatorial work of the late Felipe Solis Olguin, archaeologist who directed the National Museum of Anthropology among other important work conducted at INAH, the exhibition presents pieces recovered during excavations carried on at Teotihuacan for the last 10 years, in places like the Moon Pyramid and Xalla Palace, to the north of the Sun Pyramid.

Pieces that integrate the show come from the National Museum of Anthropology (MNA); Teotihuacan Site Museum (Estado de Mexico), Regional Museums of Michoacan and Yucatan, Templo Mayor, Mexico City, and Campeche Archaeological, all of them part of INAH Museums network; other participant museums are Diego Rivera Anahuacalli, Amparo (Puebla), Anthropology of Universidad Veracruzana, Historia Mexicana (Nuevo Leon), and institutions such as Fundacion Televisa and Instituto Mexiquense de Cultura.

“Teotihuacan, City of Gods” has already been presented in Monterrey, Nuevo Leon, the National Museum of Anthropology, and after its exhibition in Paris, it will travel to other European precincts: Rietberg Museum, in Zurich, Switzerland, Martin Gropius Bau, in Berlin, Germany, and Palazzo delle Esposizioni in Rome, Italy.

Information in Spanish, English and French is available at http://teotihuacan.culturainah.org/teotihuacan/